If They Return to You
by Jewels Light
Summary: Distance makes the heart grow fonder, will this be true for Kurt and Blaine, or is it just the beginning of the end?


If They Return…

This is my first foray into the wonderful world of Klaine fanfics… at least as an author. I've been reading them for awhile. I am not sure why I woke up this morning with this story nagging to be written but I did and it was, and I also knew from experience it wouldn't leave me alone until it got put onto paper. Any errors are mine alone as I was flying solo on this one. I hope you enjoy it.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but this little plot bunny. All characters belong to Ryan Murphy, Fox and whoever else was lucky enough to think of it and cash in!

Kurt pushed the door closed behind him, dropping his messenger bag onto the floor at his feet with a soft thump. The small apartment was dark and silent, but he couldn't be bothered to change it. He made his way toward the bedroom, and the fire escape just outside the window. He knew that was where he would find Blaine. As always, when he first caught sight of the other man, his heart stuttered in his chest before returning to its usual rhythm.

He took a moment to study his other half. Blaine's dark hair was damp and curly, and he was only clad in a pair of olive green cargo shorts. His head hung low as he stared at his bare feet. With a deep breath, Kurt crawled through the window and sat beside his best friend. Blaine didn't look at him, but he turned his hand over on his thigh, his palm facing up. Without a moment's hesitation, Kurt laced their fingers together. They sat like that for a few minutes, Kurt's stormy blue gray eyes running over the beloved profile. Neither one was surprised at the sad sigh that left his lips, but they didn't comment on it either.

"This isn't working." Kurt finally whispered, breaking the silence. Blaine's hand tightened on his convulsively, but he still didn't look up from his feet. "You aren't happy." He took a deep breath that hitched in his chest. "We're not happy." Kurt wouldn't add that the reason he wasn't happy was because of Blaine's unhappiness. He wasn't trying to make him feel guilty.

"I love you." Kurt couldn't help but smile at that, although it was watery at best. Five years after the first time he had heard it, and it still sent thrill up his spine. Tonight though, it also broke his heart just a little more.

"I love you too Blaine, but sometimes, I guess that isn't enough." He swallowed thickly, trying to fight back his tears. This was not a fight he completely won, as a tear escaped and made its way down his porcelain cheek. "I think… I think that we need to take a break from each other." he stuttered as he broke his own heart into pieces.

Now Blaine snapped his head around to look at him, his hazel eyes wide and wet. He knew that things had not been perfect, and he had been… distant lately, but he hadn't expected this conversation. Ever. He just felt so lost. Kurt knew what he wanted from his life… he had his fashion internship and his theater group. Blaine just didn't know. Yes, he was going to act and sing, but where was the passion for it. Why didn't he love what he was doing? At least he had Kurt, the one thing that he was absolutely certain about. Until now.

"You want to leave me?"

"No. I don't want to leave you, but I think I need to. I think you need me to as well. Blaine, its killing me to see you this way. " he shook his head sadly.

"I don't know how to live without you." he replied in a tiny voice that Kurt almost didn't hear.

"I think that is part of the problem, sweetie. We have been together since we were seventeen. You don't know who you are on your own. You lost yourself in us."

"But I don't want to lose _**you**_"

"Blaine, I'm not saying that we need to cut each other out of our lives completely, I am just saying that we need some time apart. Do you know how long it has been since I've heard you sing?" Blaine hung his head. "You need time. Time to make new friends, try new things… see new people if that's something you want to do. Find your spark again." Kurt's voice dropped low on the last part, feeling another piece of his heart shatter. He thought that he was that spark. What if they didn't find their way back to each other?

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm moving in with Finn and Rachel, and if that doesn't prove how much I love you I don't know what will." He said with a lopsided grin. Unfortunately, his attempt at levity was lost on the curly haired man staring at him in shock. Obviously Kurt had been thinking about this for awhile if he already had a game plan. A shard of ice worked it way into his heart.

"You're moving out?"

"You can't have time and space if I am still living here silly boy." Kurt said loftily, giving his hand a gentle squeeze.

"When?"

"I'll be gone tomorrow."

"So soon? Don't you need time to pack and…" Kurt snorted indelicately.

"Blaine, I have been taking my stuff over there for a week. It started as a game to see when you would notice." Blaine blinked at him, while Kurt gave him another sad smile. "You never did, did you? Well, that just proves my point. Besides, if I had time, I'd talk myself out of it."

"How long?" Blaine asked in a strangled voice. How had he let this happen. Yeah, he had noticed that he seemed to have more room in the closet and that the sink wasn't as cluttered with products but it had been in a casual kind of way.

"A year. On September 30, 2017 we will meet at our table at The Drip to see where we stand. 5 PM no matter what, okay?"

"Kurt…"

"Trust me sweetie, this is for the best." _I hope_. He gracefully got to his feet, and extended a hand to Blaine. The shorter man allowed himself to be pulled up and into the comforting embrace he knew so well. Kurt pressed a soft kiss to his lips before leaning their foreheads together and looking into his eyes.

"I don't want to say goodbye." Kurt pushed him away gently, and then thrust his hip out to the side and placed a hand on it, his best diva pose.

"Blaine Warbler Anderson, who said anything about goodbye? This is… See you in a year!. Besides, I waited for you once, I can wait again." He dropped the pose and once again held out his hand. "Now I am going to bed…. Are you coming with me?" Blaine nodded and followed his love through the window. He would do anything for Kurt, even if it meant locking away his heart for a year. They crawled into the bed that they had shared for 4 years, Blaine pulling Kurt back into his chest with a sigh. "Promise you'll be there?" Kurt whispered just before Blaine fell asleep.

"I promise." he replied sleepily, placing a kiss behind Kurt's ear. The next morning, when Blaine woke up, he woke up alone.

At first, they talked to each other daily, then there came a time when they realized that it had been three days and then suddenly it had been a week between calls. When a month had passed there was a time when they had finally made contact via phone and a group had apparently just arrived at the apartment for an impromptu party. Blaine had to go entertain his guests and Kurt just shook his head as he laughed softly albeit with a forlorn note to it. _Don't be a stranger, Blaine_ had been his farewell and Blaine had hung up with a chuckle and a vague answer.

Their lives began taking different paths and time has a way of changing things. At the three month mark, Blaine saw Kurt and Mercedes getting into a cab, their arms loaded down with bags and laughing merrily. Blaine hadn't even known that she was in town for a visit. At five months Kurt watched Blaine perform in an off Broadway show… accidentally. He wasn't the star, but he was the brightest, far outshining the others. Kurt also didn't miss the chemistry between him and the tall blonde that did carry the lead role. Blaine had never mentioned that he was doing it, which hurt, but that didn't stop him from sending a single white rose to his dressing room sans note.

At the eight month mark, they found themselves at the same party, thrown by friends of friends. Blaine didn't see Kurt, and Kurt made sure to keep it that way. He found himself reduced to taking shelter behind a Fichus while he watched as the love of his life sang karaoke with a tall blonde guy watching his every move.

He was singing "Happy Together" at the top of his lungs, his hazel eyes blazing and Kurt could have sworn that he was looking directly at him. Blaine even jumped up on a chair at one point. Kurt couldn't stop his chuckle, but it stopped all on its own when Blaine toppled backwards. The blonde put his arm around Blaine who looked up at him with a wide, happy smile. Kurt watched as the love of his life said something to the man holding him so tightly. Turns out its hard to laugh when you can't breathe. Kurt choked as the blonde began to lean down toward him, and Kurt began pushing his way through the inebriated crowd toward the door. There was no way he could stick around to watch that. Not again, the Rachel fiasco had been bad enough. _Guess he's happy again_. Kurt thought, tears streaming down his face. _That's what I wanted, to see that smile on his face again. _Too bad that Blaine's happiness didn't equal Kurt's this time.

Finally the year passed, and Kurt made his way to The Drip. He was nervous but the only outward sign of that fact was the death grip he had on his ever present messenger bag. Before he stepped into the coffee shop, he pushed his favorite red fedora to its accustomed rakish angle, making him feel just a bit more in control of himself. His eyes immediately zeroed the rear corner table that he and Blaine had declared as their own. He made his way toward it slowly, where a familiar dark head of curls sat facing him, although his attention was focused on his companion.

"What am I doing here again?" The blonde asked as he stared at Blaine. "Won't I ruin the touchy-feely moment?"

"You're moral support in case he doesn't come."

"Don't be a dumbass, why wouldn't he show?"

"Remind me again why I put up with you, when all you do is call me names?"

"I don't know Hobbit, could it be because you love me?" the blonde asked as he dropped him a wink.

"Yeah, I guess that could be it." Just as he said it, there was a breathy gasp from beside him. Blaine turned around to find Kurt looking at him, his glasz eyes wet but there was a wobbly smile on his lips. He gave a slight nod.

"Goodbye Blaine." He whispered. The first tear fell as he spun on his heel and walked out of the shop. Blaine remained frozen in his seat, the color draining from his face as panicky sirens began going off in his mind.

"Blaine? Was that him?" The blonde craned his neck to see what he had missed, but only saw a red fedora making its way toward the door.

"He said goodbye." His eyes widened alarm as he looked at the blonde. "Matt, Kurt just said goodbye."

"And…" he asked, obviously not understanding the significance. Meanwhile, 5 years of farewells and ended calls were flooding through Blaine's mind. _Good night, See you tomorrow, Sweet dreams, Talk to you later, TTFN, I love you, Sleep well, Until tomorrow, I'll call you tonight, Don't be a stranger_…. The list went on and on. The panic grew. Kurt had never said goodbye to him, not since he had sang 'Somewhere Only We Know' in the McKinley courtyard his Junior year and he had vowed that he would never do so. He had kept that promise, until now.

"Oh God…"

"Go after him idiot. Say hello or something, if goodbye is such a big deal." Blaine jumped up, scrambling through the maze of tables, trying to reach the door and the man that had walked through it moments before and apparently out of his life… again, but this time for good. He made it onto the sidewalk and searched around frantically. Finally he spotted the red fedora bobbing in the crowd off to the left.

"Kurt, wait!" he yelled. New Yorkers are a fairly callous bunch, and for the most part just glared at him as he pushed his way forward, yelling at the top of his lungs. "Kurt, please, just stop." he pleaded from three people behind him. Blaine saw his shoulders drop before he turned around to face the shorter man.

"Don't make this harder, please." he begged. "Just go back to him and let me go. Let me let go." A sob was pulled from him even as he was pulled into the arms that he had missed so much over the past year.

"Not going to happen. I am never letting go of you again Kurt."

"Blaine, please. I obviously don't make you happy any more, but he does."

"What are you talking about?"

"I saw you. Not that I was stalking you or anything, but over the year, I saw you. You were doing the things you love. I saw the play, you were spectacular by the way."

"You sent the rose?" Kurt tilted his head slightly in confirmation. "I suspected but never really knew for sure. I meant to tell you, but I was trying to do what you told me to do and give you space."

"No Blaine, I said that _**you**_ needed space. I didn't need any, but that is neither here nor there. I even saw you singing and crawling all over furniture again." Blaine felt a memory stirring, but it had been buried deep. On the other hand, the singing was beginning to become commonplace again. The closer he came to today the more he felt the songs bubbling within him. "It was a party at the end of May… at someone named Graham's apartment?"

"Wow, I was on the furniture? Man, I must have been even drunker than I thought. I'm surprised Graham didn't kill me." Blaine muttered, shaking his curly head bemusedly. Then his eyes shot up to catch and hold Kurt's gaze once again. "Wait, you really were there?"

"I was there… but what do you mean?"

"I thought that I had spotted you early in the evening but I never did find you. When the shots came out, I did them. Do you remember the song?"

"Happy Together." Kurt sighed. "And you looked it."

"I was singing it for you, all I could think about was how happy I was that I had seen you, or at least thought I had. I was seeing double by then, but I was positive you were in the corner. By the time I made it over there, I realized that it was just a tree." Kurt narrowed his eyes, not certain if being mistaken for a tree was an insult or not, before blanching and dropping his gaze to the sidewalk. "What is it?"

"I left before the finale of your performance." he snapped. "Watching you kiss Rachel Berry was bad enough, but the surfer, there was no way I was sticking around for that."

"Surfer? Kiss… what?" He looked at Kurt as if he had grown another head. "I guess by surfer you mean Matt, but why would I kiss him? His fiancé would kill me, even if I did want to… which I really don't." Kurt had looked up, hope beginning to shine in his oceanic eyes. God, how Blaine had missed just staring into them. "He's my roommate Kurt."

"In a one bedroom apartment?" he asked skeptically, arching a perfectly manicured brow.

"No, in our dorm room. I couldn't stay in our apartment without you there. I won't stay there unless you are with me. My parents don't even know I haven't been staying there. You know how they are." He raised his hands to frame Kurt's face gently before leaning in to press their lips together. "I love you Kurt and that hasn't changed. Will never change. I did all those things because you asked me to, and you were right…"

"I'm always right, Blaine"

"… I did lose myself. And over this year, I found that I want to teach music to kids. Found that out when I did the play. You were… ARE the best thing that has ever happened to me. This year made me see that. Every time something good happened, I wanted to run home and tell you. Every time I had a foul day I wanted to go out and vent on the fire escape, but you weren't there. Every night I told your pillow I loved you…" He shrugged at the incredulous look Kurt gave him. "You left it behind and it smelled like you. Every shooting star had the same wish, that this day would come that much faster. Please don't give me any more space Kurt, I don't think I could stand it. When you said goodbye at The Drip I think I stopped breathing."

Blaine dropped to his knee in the middle of the bustling New York City sidewalk and pulled an easily recognizable pale blue velvet box out of his pocket. "Kurt Elizabeth Hummel, will you make me the happiest man in New York and promise to never say goodbye to me again?"

"Yes " He whispered before dragging Blaine back onto his feet and kissing him soundly. "I promise."

"If you love someone, set them free. If they return to you they're yours; if they don't they never were." - Richard Bach


End file.
